At Adelaide: As Marcus Harris tucked fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah for a triple on the second day of the first Test at the Adelaide Oval, tears trickled down the eyes of his mother’s eyes. She certainly can’t be blamed for not being able to keep her emotions in check. This was her son’s first Test runs.

The 26-year-old had become Australia’s Test cricketer number 456 on Thursday when Mike Hussey handed him his Baggy Green. The mother and father, Kim, were standing right behind him and both had struggled to not let the tears roll down. On Friday, Marcus was dismissed for a well-constructed 26 in 53 ball but Kim couldn’t have been a happier man.

Playing for Australia has been a dream that the Harris family has lived since Marcus was a kid. As Kim says, “We are a father-son team so we always talk about that. I played cricket at a fairly high level. So we do know what's right and what's wrong. I have wrecked a shoulder throwing buckets and buckets of balls at him. I know what his strengths and weaknesses are and he has got better and better over the years.”

Marcus has been a heavy scorer in the Australian domestic cricket and a Test call-up is just a reward. Speaking of rewards, Marcus was rewarded 20 Australian dollars by his grandmother everytime he scored a ton as a kid. As Kim says, “She lived with us when Marcus was little fellow. Every Saturday morning she would tell Marcus that he will get 20 Australian dollar for a hundred and on days that would happen my mother would hand him over the money. When he was 15, in a particular season he hit 11 hundreds. My mother told him: “Marcus you are going to bankrupt me.” Even when he became a first-class player for Western Australia and would make a hundred, she would put in $20 in a card and write ‘to my favourite grandson’, and put it on his bed. And Marcus would tell her that she didn’t need to put $20 now as he is earning now but she would say that ‘you got to keep it as that’s the deal’. Mum passed away three years ago but yes they were very close.”

The Harris household is still coming to terms with their son’s debut and the emotions are running high. According to Kim, “It has been going on for the last two days. First there was the baggy green presentation on Thursday. And that is very big in Australian cricket and everybody dreams of that. The boys in Australia all dream of that. So to be there and see my son do that was special. It took a few takes to actually go ‘where are we? We are standing on the Adelaide Oval and 456 is his Test number and no one can take that from him. And if we had the perfect outcome, it was to be win the toss and India bat first so that he can ease the way into the game. So on Wednesday night I was discussing with a friend, who has flown here from Somerset, that our perfect day will be India nine down at close of play on day one as we didn’t want Marcus to bat for 10 minutes towards the end of the day and we got that. And then on the second day we thought what if Indian players can bat for 10-15 minutes but we will take first ball and that is what happened. So it was good. I thought Marcus batted well and will certainly pass that to him tonight. He knows that. But I know he would have wanted more because you do all the hard work. You play the first twenty overs and you want to work it through.”

At time the fathers of budding cricketers can be hard to please, but Kim says that he is happy to give Marcus his space. “If someone said to me ‘what would you take for Marcus when he comes out to bat?’, and I would say we would love to get him off the mark. He has been under the radar of Australia cricket for a long time. This is another level for him and I think he can handle that. I honestly believe that he can do it.”

Both Kim and Marcus will be hoping that he can get a bit more if Australia come out to bat again in this game and in the following Tests.